


Thine Enemy

by Ayrith



Series: Mine Enemy [2]
Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Alternate Timeline, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon-Typical Violence, Enemies to Friends to Lovers to Enemies to friends to..., Enemies to Lovers, Everyone has an agenda, F/M, Family Issues, Group dynamics, Lovers To Enemies, Sequel, Sexual Tension, Trust Issues, Where do we go from here?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:27:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25396135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ayrith/pseuds/Ayrith
Summary: Human, youkai, hanyou. When the scariest of monsters can pass for man, who are the real demons? Sequel to Mine Enemy.
Relationships: Higurashi Kagome/Miroku, InuYasha/Sango (InuYasha), Naraku/Sango (InuYasha)
Series: Mine Enemy [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1635856
Comments: 21
Kudos: 53





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a direct sequel to my fic “Mine Enemy”. I strongly recommend reading that one first, as the sequel sits squarely in the realm of canon divergence. The previous story began right as Sango joined the group which means Inuyasha has not yet mastered the Wind Scar and the history of InuTaisho’s swords are unknown. Lastly, the M-Rating is for canon-style violence and eventual adult themes. All characters in this work are at an age of consent. 
> 
> Hello! So very excited to start this new adventure. :) I have no clue what the final chapter count is going to be yet as I am intending to post in shorter chapters than I did in the previous work. Will update when I get a better sense. For now, hope you enjoy this new beginning and see you soon. :)

As first meetings go, theirs had been a rather poor one.

It started with a sound in the air. A low pitch whine, similar to the hiss of the wind or the whispers of the illusive wind scar, building in subtle and hypnotizing crescendo. By the time Inuyasha's hackles raised and he realized that something very powerful and very fast was howling directly towards him, it was nearly too late.

Natural instinct would have had him dodge to the side, but Kagome had been standing in front of him and she didn't hear it, didn't sense the specter of death hurtling towards them. It made him throw out instinct and dash forward, tuck her under his arm, jerk Miroku towards him, and duck.

It saved them. He sensed what felt like a massive youkai arm slice the air above his head at speeds that would have turned even the dullest bludgeoning object into a ruthless blade. Trees toppled around them like the heads of dandelions and wind aftershocks buffeted them. But the weapon—for it had to be a weapon, it's reach was so long—did not continue charging forward, but _curved_ , veering sharply to the left, as if chasing the ghost of his instinct. It's unerring path had sent a chill down his spine.

Later he would come to learn that this was the _Tajiya_ way — a battle waged not by brute strength but through careful, calculated attrition. Weapons that twisted or spiraled in unnatural ways, powders that blocked or overwhelmed the senses, tools that preyed on confusion, complacency, and instinct.

Inuyasha didn't know the demon slayers then beyond the sad human corpses that had fought off hordes of vengeful demons. Or as a conversation piece to the greater topic of the Shikon Jewel. But legends were full of lies and he didn't trust what he hadn't seen himself, or at least throttled with his own bare hands.

What he did know was that seeing such a massive, unwieldy weapon so precisely manipulated had him baring his fangs. So when the weapon sailed in a return arc back to it's owner, he had pushed Kagome behind him and turned with a growl to face this new, dangerous threat.

It had been a human. A young woman who seemed barely out of the cusp of girlhood. But behind her, the faint shadow of a white baboon pelt had made him snarl. He braced himself for the horrors Naraku typically invited, like staring up at the slow slide of an avalanche beginning it's ominous descent.

The girl stepped forward.

She stood above him at the end of a newly formed aisle of broken trees, in a dark body suit and with her hair tied up and whipping in the wind. Even from the distance he could see the purple circles like bruises under her eye sockets, the sharp jut of hollow cheekbones over a tied mask. The wind shifted, carrying the sharp smells of sickness, leather, the burn of chemicals, the lingering smell of old youkai, and blood. Hers.

It didn't matter. She'd raised a casual hand in the air and the deadly bone weapon had slung into her hand like a child's toy spin top. When their eyes snagged across the large distance, he'd froze. That she was on the verge of bleeding to death flew straight from his mind.

"So you're that bastard Inuyasha." Her voice was cold, but her _eyes_. As wild as the molten fires that ravaged his mother's old home, as sharp as the gleam of metal beneath hot blood or the hiss of poison in his brother's claws. Like a mirror of a long ago priestess's wrath. "I will _kill_ you for what you've done."

"Sa—Sango," old flea Myouga whispered, clinging to his shoulder.

Then she began to descend towards them, and even at walking pace there was nothing slow or imminent about her. Hers was the thunderous eruption hurtling towards the edge of a cliff, a thousand crying voices cut short by a vicious stroke.

From the corner of his eye, he'd seen that bastard Naraku just stand back, smiling.

And he'd thought, _Not again._

* * *

**Thine Enemy**

**Chapter One**

* * *

The day the Taijya named Sango left them, they found him deep within the forest, alone.

The way had been slow going, made worse by the terrain. Tall coniferous trees clustered in dense clots, their overlapping trunks blocking out light and air. Only feeble shafts of lavender teased at the coming of dawn, illuminating the uneven floor grown over with vegetation.

A young man in monk robes leaned heavily against the side of an enormous cat, his heavy-lidded eyes bloodshot and the veins of his neck faintly purple. A few steps ahead, a more clear-eyed young woman, carrying a staff in one hand and a sheathed sword thrust into the band of her skirt, picked carefully over the rocks. Dirt and scratches covered her hands and knees and a tear along the back of her shirt exposed glimpses of pale skin, but she appeared otherwise unharmed. So too was the young red haired fox child beside her, shocking green eyes darting around as he scrambled over rock and tested the air with a quivering nose.

It was Kirara who stilled first, her large feline head turning to the east, ears flicking back and the hair on her body standing on end. The rumble deep from her chest stirred Miroku, who with a shaky exhale let go so the cat could bound in silent leaps unto an old toppled tree trunk and settle low, waiting.

By then, Kagome had diverted course and hurried over, Shippou at her heels. As the monk slowly traversed the slippery mossy floor behind them, face stiff and pained, the girl approached Kirara and settled a hand on her thick mane. The cat's muscles were tense, trembling.

Pulse pounding, Kagome peered into the break between the tree gaps, squinting in the darkness. And then she too, froze.

She heard Shippou gasp beside her. He started to dart forward but Kirara, lightning swift, snapped her head and pulled him back by his shirt with her teeth. The kit whimpered, but stopped. When the cat's large, red eyes with their slitted irises slanted towards Kagome, she nodded, heart in her throat, and set the monk's staff down on the ground. With sweaty hands, she dug out the sheathed sword from where it made a hard, ugly red mark digging against her hip.

"Kagome."

She looked to find Miroku still on a level below, his hand on a gnarled root, looking up at her. His forehead was wet with sweat and his lips pale and chapped, but he held her gaze firmly, a question in his eyes. His eyes were that deep indigo color that reminded her of documentaries of the bottom of the ocean, only the tint of red in his sclera to suggest that he had been bleeding out of them from effects of poison hours before. And despite all that, he was still trying to be kind.

She shook her head, clutching the sword to her chest. "I'll go. He's—" she stopped, swallowing hard, and turned back to the clearing, feeling the prick of tears in her eyes. "It's okay. He won't hurt me," she whispered.

She stepped forward into a small clearing.

There was black blood everywhere. Bathing the ferns in a black carpet, dripping off the ragged tops of splintered trees, trunks as wide as barrels reduced to sawdust and toothpicks. Chunks of demons lay all over. There was an enormous body of a hulking oni impaled on one splintered tree, it's mouth hanging open and it's eyes milky white. Another, coiled like a snake and gleaming iridescent scales under the smear of blood, slumped in several scattered pieces at the far end.

As Kagome approached, her shoes squelching on the wet grass, the black began to slowly turn a dull violet. And then she stopped at the edge of what looked like a circle of bloody lilies and stared.

A hanyou stared back at her on his knees amid the flowers, chest heaving and air hissing through his nose. His silver hair was dark and matted. His hands, caked in dried blood to the wrists with nails tipped like long needles, lay turned up on his knees. His eyes, normally a ruddy gold, were turquoise slits flanked by demon red.

"Inuyasha," she whispered.

He did not respond to that, though his irises seemed to track the flutter of her pulse, the rattle of her breath, the sway of the scabbard in her hands.

This close, she could see his skin was a map of angry raw marks like hundreds of starbursts across his chest and back, all in various degrees of healing. At some point during the night, the top half of his haori had ripped clear off and was now slowly starting to return, the edges of the fabric glowing faint gold as it reassembled. But at the center of his stomach the material stuck wet to his skin and Kagome bit her lip hard at the flash of dark twisted flesh hidden by the fluttering fabric.

If he'd been human, he would be dead. As it was, if he was in any pain he did not show it. His face was passive and untouched save for a jagged mark on his left cheek that curved under his eye, like the fine layers of his skin had been scratched away to reveal a purple layer beneath. Another mark, hairline thin and fine, was beginning to show on the other side.

As he continued to watch her, Kagome took the remaining steps forward, falling to her knees in the wet flowers. At the fine spray of blood kicked up by her fall, she watched him began to stiffen, his long clawed hands trembling, a hiss behind the sharp canines jutting over his lower lip.

"Hey," she said, voice breaking. "I brought Tetsusaiga. I know you'd have been furious if you lost it."

The harsh noise that came from deep in his chest made her flinch. His eyes flashed with something like confusion, jaw working, and then he stilled once more, a fine tremor in his shoulders.

Kagome pressed the sword into his clawed hands, shaking. "You saved us. Again." Tears spilled down her cheeks. "You drew them away. I'm sorry we couldn't—that _I_ couldn't—" she breathed hard through her nose at the low croon he suddenly made, half growl and whine between grinding teeth, then shivered at the line of blood trickling down his nicked chin.

She looked down at their hands, vision blurred. "Inuyasha. Please."

A rattling breath from deep in his chest. Then slowly and disjointed, as if his hands no longer naturally bent that way, Inuyasha's claws closed in a fist around Tetsusaiga.

* * *

"Hold on," Kagome murmured to Kaede, as they both leaned into Kirara's mane and the large cat began it's descent to the remains of the Taijya village.

 _She's grown thin_ , the older woman reflected as she tightened her arm on the girl's waist, shivering against the chill wind.

That was, of course, the least of Kaede's worries. Hours before, when Kagome had run full tilt into her home at Edo village alone and covered in dried blood, Kaede had feared the worst. The girl who had visited more than a month ago, who cried easily, who shouted loudly over every argument, who grumbled under her breath when doing laundry at the river, was no where to be seen today.

Instead, Kagome had followed her around as Kaede packed supplies, explaining in halting words that Sango was missing and Inuyasha was in in a terrible state, that they needed the older priestess's assistance at once.

The evasive look in her eyes had been troubling. The words that she had not said, ominous.

But what Kaede did not expect, as the two dismounted the feline youkai's back and Kagome lead her towards one of the still standing village structures, was to see the monk sitting heavily on the front step with his head in bandaged hands.

To see the house door barred shut, the external walls plastered with ofuda, and someone clearly trapped inside.

A sound like a hoarse, gut wrenching scream shook from within the house, familiar and chilling. The writings on the ofuda flared white hot, then faded.

"My god," Kaede said, staring at the house, then at Kagome's back as the girl hurried forward to the monk, a hand falling to his shoulder.

Miroku looked up as Kaede approached, face tired. Two thin cuts on his forehead bled sluggishly. "He is not himself. We barely made it here before..." Another shout, a snarl that cut off on a gasping breath. The ofuda flared against the walls again. Miroku's mouth tucked down, shoulder's hunching. "...We did not know what to do."

Kaede took a deep breath, then began to roll up her sleeves. "Send for Myouga. His retainer will have some answers." She approached the barred door, putting a hand on the hastily constructed barricade, and then paused. When she looked over her shoulder, Kagome was already there, pale and afraid.

There was no time for pity. "If you would."

Kagome flinched slightly. Then she closed her eyes, brows knit, and her voice dragged from her in a bare whisper.

" _Osuwari_."

* * *

There were demons, everywhere: clawing at him, biting into him, pulling on him, crunching under him, bleeding on him, screaming at him, dying from him.

Inuyasha was stuck. Night and enemies continued unceasing. In the back of his mind somewhere, he knew that. But the demons that poured from between the trees were an endless, snarling mass and there was no time to think, just fight.

At first his blade was a cleave with which he mowed down his enemies like millet seed. But eventually the blade grew heavy, the edge caught on sinew or the join of bone and took too long to wrench free. Eventually he had to rip them off of him with his bare hands, and then at some point the blade was gone and his body was numb and the blood was running. All that he felt was that sensation of slicing with the end of his claws and in the blur of teeth and scale and red blood eyes, there was only room for kill or be killed.

He should have pulled back. He should have regrouped with Miroku and Kagome, had Kirara take them far away to safety, should have retreated to grieve and lick wounds and prepare for their next full scale assault. Because Naraku would not have his way this time. Because Sango's family, _if_ they were not imposters, clearly did not understand the truth. He'd beat it into their skulls if he had to.

But he'd taken one look at Sango's face, watched her expression chill, and all such plans had flown from his mind. Her eyes had been wet, flat. It'd been like meeting her for the first time all over again, that slim pitiful woman with death hanging over her shoulder and a vengeance to scorch the earth. And his heart had sank. He'd known that if he did not reach her now, there was no going back.

It didn't matter if her father or brother understood, because _Sango_ understood. Once she made a decision, it was as fixed as stone. Sango—loyal, honorable, stubborn, selfish, stupid Sango, with the _nasty_ fucking habit of thinking that removing herself from their lives was all it would ever take to disappear.

Look where they were now. She was gone. And he...

 _Did she know?_ came the sibilant whisper in his ear.

Inuyasha whipped his head right, then jerked back, hissing as a youkai sank it's teeth into his arm. By the time he'd wrenched the thing free, skull crushed in his hand, the voice had circled around, accompanied by the slithering of a heavy body against wet, bloody grass. Opal scales gleamed in the slash of moonlight between the trees and then revealed itself to be a serpant youkai in the shape of a woman. Jewels of sapphire and emerald bedazzled her neck and hung between heavy bare breasts.

 _There was no way she could not know,_ in his mind, like a caress, _that you all might die for her choice._

Inuyasha's hands shook. He began to stalk towards it, batting another monster away, then hissed as two more piled on to his back. As if sensing his intentions the mass of youkai renewed their fervor. With a snarl, gold yoki sparking off his skin, he began wrenching them off him in pieces, hurling their bodies into each other as he carved a path towards the one that hung back, watching.

 _Did she care?_ The serpant youkai smiled, a row of sharp pointed teeth. _Did it even matter?_

Inuyasha felt the fangs in his mouth go heavy, felt the edges of his vision go red as he swayed, then lunged towards it.

The serpent surged forward too and they met in the middle. Claws and scales, hisses and snarls, fangs and teeth. His hand pierced her chest at the exact instance her barbed tail plunged into his stomach. The trash mob around them froze, fading out of his senses, as he coughed wet, lungs filling with fluid.

The serpent leaned in close, her painted red lips curving into a victorious smile even as black blood dripped heavy down her chin.

 _"_ Was she so ready to throw you away?" it whispered.

Except it was not the voice of a woman. It was _his_.

Something snapped inside him.

Inuyasha wrenched his arm free of the youkai's chest with a jerk, pulsating red heart beating in his palm. With a wet squelch he crushed it in his fingers, dropping it to the ground as he then returned both clawed hands to wrap around the serpent woman's pale throat.

"I'll come and ask her myself, _Naraku._ " he snarled around elongated teeth, the reflection of his eyes in the youkai's own flashes of red and turquoise. "So why don't you tell her that for me like a good little bitch?"

And then his arms bunched tight and in a burst of gold yoki he _ripped_ the youkai apart at the seams just as something from behind latched on and bit him sharply in the neck—

* * *

The first thing Inuyasha saw when he opened his eyes was Kaede seated across from him, rosary beads wrapped around her wrists and hands shaped in prayer. The heavy wrinkles in her face were deeper than usual, her eyes tired.

"Welcome back, Inuyasha," the old lady said grimly.

Footsteps echoed from the corner of the room. He looked up just in time to see the flash of Kagome's profile as she bolted out the door, hand pressed to her mouth.

"My lord," Myouga wheezed, belly up on the floor beside him, bloated and purple in the face. He looked faint, more than he should have after having apparently gorged himself on so much blood.

Inuyasha pulled his hand away from his neck, turning to look at the droplets of red and purple blood there. His eyes caught instead on the raked and splintered wood floor beneath him, as if something heavy had struggled and smashed into it again and again.

Scattered around him like spilled stones were the familiar beads of the subjugation rosary on broken thread, glowing with a faint purple light. So too did Tetsusaiga, which he gripped in a white knuckled hand, the hilt digging sharply into his chest.

Hackles raised, Inuyasha licked his lips and wasn't even surprised at the sharp nick of his mouth against heavy, long fangs.

Kaede and he stared at each other.

Inuyasha cleared his throat, voice hoarse and thready. "Hello, old bat."

The old woman just sighed.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas and happy New Year. Looking forward to what 2021 will bring. My outline for this fic is tentatively mapped at 16 chapters, so expect it to be around there or longer depending on word counts.

* * *

**Thine Enemy**

**Chapter Two**

* * *

"Poison," Myouga moaned woefully, leaning heavily over the rim of a steaming tea cup sat on the floor for him. He was normal sized now after a quick trip outside to disgorge what he'd extracted from Inuyasha, though there was likely a patch of ground out there that would never grow anything again. "How did you taint your father's blood so, master?"

Inuyasha hunched over in the firelight, bare to the waist as Kaede administered salve to his back and Shippou hovered. The gaping wound in the hanyou's gut blossomed deep red under new bandages. "I was a little preoccupied with staying _alive_ ," he sneered, ears flat on his head.

The old flea sighed. "Right, of course. Cannot be helped, I suppose."

Kagome, oddly silent, wrapped her arms around her knees from where she sat on the steps, eyes low. Kirara lay beside her in small form, back to the others and head tucked under her tails. Across from the fireplace, Miroku put his chin in his hand. The bandage on his forehead shown stark in the low light. "I am more concerned," the monk said carefully, eyes flicking to catch Inuyasha's in the firelight, "about what happened after."

The flea was silent for a moment, then turned to the hanyou. "What do you remember?"

_Blood in his mouth, a fist in his gut. Gleaming eyes, cold and imperious._

_Was she so ready to throw you away?_

Inuyasha shifted uncomfortably, growling as Kaede nudged him in the shoulder with a "Don't move." He settled for a faint shrug.

Myouga stroked his short beard. "Curious. Did you lose Tetsusaiga?"

Said sword rested flat on the ground next to him. He nudged it with a claw. "It's right here."

Myouga shook his head. "I meant was there a moment that you let it out of your sight?"

Inuyasha frowned. He _always_ carried Tetsusaiga, though Myouga could fuck off thinking he needed reminding. He was about to snap as such but stopped at a change on the peripheral of his senses, a ripple rising above the regular, static noise. An increased heart beat. His eyes flicked to Kagome, who was staring at her shoes.

She said softly, "He did," and Inuyasha stiffened.

"I thought as much." The flea settled cross-legged on the rim of the tea cup. "It was hard to tell with the poison at first, but it's there, faint yet unmistakable." Myouga stared moodily at Inuyasha. "There's been a change in your blood."

Inuyasha shifted uncertainly. "So?"

Myouga looked at the tea. "Tetsusaiga was meant to protect you from all peril, and not just from your enemies. Sometimes the threats within pose the greatest danger."

A beat of pregnant silence.

"Spit it out, Myouga," Inuyasha said lowly. "I'm not in the mood for your usual crap today."

Myouga shot him a look, then sighed. "You come from a very strong blood lineage, master. Tracing back eons, each generation stronger than the next. Though in a less pure form, that strong blood still runs through you and in times of danger, it will raise to the challenge. Only…" Myouga gave the hanyou an apologetic look. "…your body was not built to take it."

Purity. It always came down to blood, didn't it? Inuyasha's fist clenched. "What else is new."

"Tetsusaiga can suppress it. But," the flea frowned here, tone turning reproachful, "it cannot protect you if it is not _on_ you."

Before Inuyasha could move to knock over the tea cup his retainer sat on, Miroku interrupted, "So if Tetsusaiga cannot protect him, his youkai blood is left unchecked. What happens? Does he become…" He hesitated and Inuyasha blinked slowly.

But Myouga was already shaking his head. "A youkai? No. The blood is there, but not the mind and body to sustain it. Instead of strength, it becomes like a poison. One could call it youkai, yes, but it is little more than shadow." And then quietly, the faintest thread of regret, "Such a state only ever ends in tragedy."

Inuyasha's ears flattened. Kaede's hands stilled only momentarily on his shoulder before resuming laying fabric along his spine.

No one said anything for awhile. Then, "Didn't you think," Inuyasha muttered at last, claws picking holes in his clothes, "you could have mentioned this from the start?"

"I didn't think it necessary," Myouga grumbled. "Before the shattering of the jewel, you generally avoided opponents that could kill you." At Inuyasha's glare, he amended, "I am sure there were not many, Master, but you must admit the number has increased as of late. I wish you had the good sense to flee once in awhile."

Annoyance came easy, like a worn path beneath a turning wheel."I never needed to since you are always running away _for_ me—" he cut off at a sharp poke from Kaede. "That _hurts,_ you old hag!"

"Be still," she warned. "Or I will knock ye out with sleeping weed again." Beside her, Shippou gave a quiet snort, then hid behind the woman as Inuyasha veered to look at him.

Miroku rubbed at his forehead. "I should like some myself after all this," he said dryly. "But returning to the point. So as long as Inuyasha keeps Tetsusaiga close to him, this will not become a problem?"

Myouga hesitated, turning to the hanyou. "You have awoken to the power in your blood. That is not a gate you simply close."

Inuyasha resisted the urge to rub his left eye with a knuckle. Though the damage had healed, the memory of Sesshoumaru ripping the black pearl from his skull still lingered, raising his hackles again. "The old man never gave me something I didn't have to pay a price for."

Myouga looked sadly at the hanyou. "Your father never wanted this for you."

If it had been simply pity, Inuyasha would have spat on the ground and been done with it. Instead he stared at the old youkai, reminded once again that the retainer had actually known his father. Not through words or stories or old rotting bones, but through having served him in the flesh, walked with him through distant lands and watched him conquer untold enemies.

Had he ever told his father to have the good sense to flee?

Inuyasha shook himself suddenly, like a dog dislodging water from its coat, silver hair whipping into nearby faces. Shippou squeaked and jumped back, the bottle of salve next to him toppling over at the motion. Kaede leaned away, lips pressed together, but this time she knew better than to protest as Inuyasha stiffly jerked to his feet. His new bandages were already deepening to a fine red, color spidering up his chest as he roughly snatched his haori from the ground.

"Yeah well," the hanyou muttered to the room, his throat working to swallow down bitterness like a fine, familiar wine. "I am what he made me."

* * *

Kagome came out later to find him sitting on the ground in the yard, stripping the bark off a stray branch with careful precision. His ears flicked back as he listened to her feet carry her to one of the wooden poles spotted through the clearing and pause.

"What do you think these are?" She asked, peering down the side of one, her fingers probing the scarred surface. "Feels like there is writing on this one."

Inuyasha glanced at the object she was examining. "Training posts."

Kagome's brow furrowed. "Really?" A delicate finger traced the whirls in the wood. "I thought there was a training hall near the front of the village."

Inuyasha shrugged, tossing a chunk of bark into the grass. "Don't ask me. Humans don't make sense."

Kagome contemplated that, leaning back against the post to stare up at the large house they'd been staying at for weeks. The house of the village chieftain, the _okashira_. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her bite her lip.

"Why do you think Sango never told us?"

Inuyasha's shoulders immediately hunched. "Told us what?"

"That we were staying in her home." Kagome stared at the shadows of the yard. "She never said a word."

"She always kept secrets," he said, and the bitterness there was undeniable. At this point, why try to hide it?

Silence.

Then Kagome moved away from the post and took a step towards him. "Inuyasha. About the other day. About Sango. I—"

The branch in his hands gave a loud crack as he split it in half and she stopped. He tossed the smaller piece over his shoulder. "Don't bother."

"But…"

"It doesn't matter anymore."

Her heart spiked, a pattern of anger before her voice belied it. "Don't say that. We are going to get Sango back."

"Oh yeah?" he turned to glare at her and saw her draw back a little, heart skipping. His fist clenched, but he continued, "And what are you going to do when she refuses to?"

"There has to be a good reason she left." Kagome said firmly. "She wouldn't just do that to us."

"There is and she did," he sneered, turning away. "Sango will do anything for her family. That's the only thing she was ever up front about."

"That's your anger talking. You don't believe that." When he just snorted, Kagome stomped her foot. "So what, that's it? We're just going to abandon her—"

"I didn't abandon her," he thundered, vaulting to his feet as she backed abruptly into the wooden training pole, mouth snapping shut. "She abandoned _us_."

They stared at each other. It was fucking unfair, sometimes, that moments like this he was dumbstruck by how Kagome looked to him. Her eyes wide, long wet lashes blinking at him. The trembling curve of her soft mouth. Her delicate hands, fisting in her shirt. Her rapid heartbeat, a pulse in her throat, that familiar pattern over the last few days that he was starting to learn and was starting to hate.

She was afraid of him now, after she had found him in the woods.

And why shouldn't she be?

"Inuyasha," Kagome said, eyes shiny, but she didn't cry. "You are not the only one that is hurting."

He threw the remaining branch on the ground. "Fine. We'll get Sango back. You happy now?" He turned away from her. "Just go away, Kagome."

"Would you stop— Inuyasha!" she shouted, taking a step towards him but he was already stalking away, jumping into a tree and out of her sight. "I'm trying to say you are not alone!"

Inuyasha grit his teeth. Alone? She didn't even know what that meant. His shoulders hitched tight, but he continued moving away, because if he turned around he was going to say something they'd both regret. Even he was getting tired of it.

Inuyasha walked in the dark for a long time, circling the perimeter of the village over and over again, casting every troublesome, niggling thought back into the shadows where it belonged with the pounding of his feet or a driven fist into a tree. There was no point in thinking about things, no point in pondering on what could have been, it just was what it was. He was what he was. Sango was what she was. They all were only what they could ever be.

When he finally launched himself into a tree branch for the night, back against the trunk and his arms tucked into the sleeves of his haori, he closed his eyes, resolving himself for a night of either restlessness or fruitless nightmares.

* * *

_Given the extent of her injuries, Inuyasha had expected the taijiya to be in a coma for a week._

_Within two days, Kagome came out to the porch, expression concerned. "Have either of you seen Sango?"_

_Miroku looked up from the ofuda he was painting. "No." He looked at the hanyou._

_Inuyasha sat up from his lounging position on the grass and grunted, sniffing the air. The smell of blood lingered, a hazy trail winding around the buildings. "She's around," he shrugged._

_Kagome chewed her lip. "I think her bandages need changing."_

_Shippou piped up from underneath a mess of fresh laundry. "I'll go find her."_

_He was about to scamper off when he was abruptly grabbed by the tail by Inuyasha. He tossed the kit back to Kagome, who caught him with only a slight fumble. "You stay put, brat. Don't go near her for awhile. She's dangerous."_

_"Sango is not dangerous—" Kagome began, temper flickering in her eyes._

_Only to be cut off as Inuyasha said bluntly, "Not to you."_

_Humans, he didn't say. But his meaning was clear._

_Kagome closed her mouth, and looked away, tucking Shippou more securely in her arms. An awkward silence fell over them, save for the flip of paper as Miroku completed one ofuda and moved on to the next._

_Shippou stared at them as they avoided each other's eyes, face wrinkling in confusion. "What do you mean?" He looked first at Kagome, then Miroku beseechingly. "Isn't she our friend now?"_

_Miroku stared at the ward paper in his hand, rubbing a thumb over the edge as he thought his words over carefully. Finally he said, "What he means is that Sango is processing. Naraku has told her convincing lies. She is coming to terms with his treachery and the fact that we are not the enemy."_

_Inuyasha snorted, rolling his shoulder where the taijiya had run him through with a blade. "Speak for yourself. You're not the one she tried to decapitate."_

_Miroku cleared his throat, giving Inuyasha a hard stare. "She needs time."_

_"Well right now, she needs medicine," Kagome interrupted with finality, glaring the two men down. When Miroku shrugged, flipping another page, she turned to Inuyasha, anger giving way to worry. "Can you go find her?"_

_"Why me?" he groused. "Why can't Miroku go look for her?"_

_Kagome's shoulders slumped. "Please?"_

_Inuyasha stared for a long moment, then looked away, mouth flattening. He hated that word. The way that she looked at him, like he was her savior. The way he couldn't help himself getting up to do as she bid, even when everything he'd done for weeks was to discourage her from even asking._

_He followed the scent of blood through the ghost town of the demon slayers, past the empty houses and the broken piked fence. Eventually he came to a rocky plateau just outside the village and found the girl taijiya standing alone at the center of the clearing, her back to him._ _She was wearing a hastily drawn kimono over her bare shoulders and even from this distance, the smell of blood coming off her completely eclipsed any other smells. He couldn't even tell what her natural scent must be like, only bitter iron mixed with Kagome's odd smelling salves and bandages._

_He slowed, then stopped altogether as what she was staring at came into his line of sight. Even in the fading light of the setting sun, the rows of the Taijiya graves were still visible._

_He was already turning to leave when she spoke suddenly, back still to him._

_"Did you do this?" She said. Her voice was hoarse and faint, but he could hear her all the same. So too the rapid tattoo of her heart, so at odds with the blank expression on her face._

_Inuyasha slowly turned to look down at the nearest mound of earth, face flat. Five rows, each eight to ten abreast. "We did."_

_Sango's foot toed the dirt. "The earth is hard here. Must have taken awhile."_

_Inuyasha grunted. He wasn't about to say so, but he'd initially argued with Miroku that it was a huge effort to carry the bodies out here, away from the livable land, when it was clear the village would never stand again. He'd eventually held his tongue after Kagome had just quietly picked up a shovel and started to dig. While the other's had dug the graves, it had been left to him to pull the bodies from within collapsed houses or beneath the hulking youkai corpses._

_He'd understood their insistence, after that. So many small fragile hands hanging limp and lifeless beneath a pile of rubble or in the jaws of a beast. So many faces made unrecognizable by violence, forcing him—a hanyou used to the world's cruelty and senseless slaughter—to pause every time, sick to his stomach, as he carefully searched for some fabric to cover them with._

_Never in his life had he buried so many people. Never so many women and children._

_"We did what we could," he said._

_At that, Sango glanced up at him finally, and at the look on her face he grimaced, shifting on his feet. Stupid as he was about such things, even he wasn't blind to the gutted and banked look in her eyes, like a yawning pit that descended into unfathomable depths._

_He knew that look. There was nothing that could fill it except more spilled blood, and even then that might never be enough._

_"Thank you," Sango said quietly._

* * *

At dawn, Inuyasha woke up to the patter of swift feet in the dew. He had barely cracked open his eyes when a warm bundle jumped into his lap and whiskers started aggressively rubbing against his chin.

Inuyasha instinctively leaned back, ears flat, and then blinked blearily down at Kirara in her small form, who was purring loud enough to stir the nearby birds.

This was new. While Kirara was affectionate, she normally centered that attention on the girls or the fox kit. She'd flirt and then snub Miroku in an amusing game very reminiscent to the monk's usual chase for feminine affection, but with Inuyasha she had never been particularly sweet. Admittedly, he would have received it about as well as a prickly bush, especially in front of Shippou who would no doubt taunt him about getting soft.

So this surprise ninja attack was new. And suspicious.

Kirara purred louder, placing a demanding paw on his chest. Rolling his eyes, Inuyasha brought his hands up tentatively to pet her soft fur just as he'd seen the others do and was surprised a bit when she mewled at him approvingly, proceeding to bask in the attention for a few quiet minutes. A scratch behind the ears had her eyes half lidding, and he smirked just a little, before dropping his hands away to her immediate protest.

"Don't give me that," he said. "What are you bothering me for?"

Kirara huffed, fur bristling a little as she got to her feet. Then she moved up his chest and lifted a paw, placing it on his cheek. Her scarlet, intelligent eyes bore into him.

Kirara was ancient. She didn't need to speak to be understood. Of all his companions, this was the one that had him instinctually hunching his shoulders whenever she was watching him. She'd lived eons before any of them and would live eons since and it didn't matter if she was the size of a kitten or a bear, he knew well enough to not piss her off.

To be quite honest, he didn't know why Kirara was even still with them, never mind here at the moment in his lap. She was the guardian of the Taiijya and had been so for hundreds of years. The only reason the cat youkai had not been with Sango the night she disappeared was because she had been protecting Shippou. When Kirara hadn't quietly disappeared afterwards, he had figured she would make her intentions known in due time.

And right now, she was wanting him to follow her.

With a sniff, Kirara circled in his lap, then hopped back to the forest floor. Inuyasha rolled off the branch, wind whistling in his hair, and landed in a graceful crouch beside her at the same time she transformed into her large form. A quick glance at him with her red eyes, and then she was walking into the brush, twin tails flickering between the trees. He followed her.

It didn't take long for him to recognize where they were headed.

Demon corpse didn't decay very fast, but the black blood they shed was far more putrid, easily carrying over a distance. The demonic scavengers of the night had picked off a significant portion of the corpses from the battle a few days ago, though some remains were still left here and there. Only the crows dared touch the corpses during the day, all other animals staying well enough way.

Inuyasha watched as one blinked eyes at him, picking at the remains of a demon. When another tried to snag its meat, its eyes flashed red, caws and talons interrupting the still morning air. He paused, contemplating killing the birds now before too much demon meat turned them into demons themselves, but Kirara had continued onward, and with a sneer at the birds eying him, he followed.

The farther he went, picking his way through the broken path before them, the more uneasy he became. The forest looked like a giant creature had barreled through it, breaking branches, uprooting trees, cutting through bush and rock alive. That had been… him, hadn't it?

A few minutes later, Inuyasha entered a small clearing and then froze at the underlying scents beneath the smell of blood. His hackles rose.

It had been here.

The spot where Sango had fought him.

The spot where he had practically begged her to stay.

Inuyasha grit his teeth. "Why did we come here?"

Kirara was standing over a spot, waiting. Something gleamed in the dirt at her feet. With reluctance, he crouched down, pulling a cord from the wet dirt. At the base of the cord something heavy hung, obscured with mud.

He laid the object in his palm and brushed his thumb against the grimy surface. With each streak of dirt, the motion revealed petrified demon wood underneath, and on its carved side full of grit, a pattern of waves.

It was the whistle that Sango had carried. The one that had summoned Kirara across a vast distance, when it had been otherwise impossible to find her. The one Naraku had probably given her.

Kirara nosed it, her breath warm against his palm, and then looked up at him expectantly.

Inuyasha stared. She couldn't be serious. "I can't have this," he told her.

Kirara sat down on her haunches, cocking her head at him.

He held it out to her, shaking it. "I don't want it. Give it to someone else."

She snorted, then gave him a long stare. And her meaning was as clear as crystal.

_She gave it to you._

Inuyasha grit his teeth. So many people kept piling on their expectations. He didn't want to carry this for Kirara, and certainly not for _her_. She didn't deserve it and she'd known it. Wasn't that why she had told him she understood if he couldn't forgive her?

He hadn't forgiven her.

_"Thank you," Sango said quietly._

_Kaede had once told him—when Kikyou's remains had been stolen by that accursed witch—that graves were not for the dead, but for the living. Like most things in life, however, what cut one way could also cut the other. As Inuyasha watched Sango stare at the mass graves of her village with dead eyes, he turned to leave and felt the first stirrings of pity._

_For some, a grave was closure to grief._

_For others, it was just the beginning of it._

Kirara was gazing at him, waiting.

"Damn it," Inuyasha said finally, closing his fist around the whistle. "I'll hold it, but just because you asked. And when I see her next, don't be fucking surprised when I throw it back in her face."

With something close to a sigh, Kirara leaned into him just a little, a warm back against the cool breeze, and for just a moment, he let her.

Then he stood up, shaking his hair out like a dog, and began walking back the way they'd come.

"Let's go," he said. "This place reeks."

There was the sound of transformation behind him, and Kirara hopped on his shoulder. She stuck her face in his thick silver hair and gave a reproachful mewl, her tail lashing against his sleeves.

"Don't get all mushy on me. You can walk just fine, can't you?" He muttered, though he didn't bother dislodging her. She'd probably attack him in his sleep if he tried. "I'm not a fucking Taijiya."

The cat sniffed, swatting a gentle paw against his ear.

* * *

"Where were you?" Miroku asked when he showed up back at the house with Kirara trotting at his heels and several large black feathers stuck in his hair.

He pulled one out, nose wrinkling as he tossed it on the ground. "Getting rid of pests."

Kaede, who had been sitting on the porch and rubbing her aching knees, nodded and proceeded to stand with a grimace. A few feet away, Kagome was staring stonily into the horizon, her large pack on her back. She only glanced away when Kirara pranced over to her and transformed into her large cat form, putting her big head under her arm. The girl looked down, smiling just briefly, before her eyes caught Inuyasha looking at her. Her smile disappeared and she looked away, frowning.

Shippou swung his little legs from his seat on the porch. He looked quieter then normal. "What now?" he asked.

As one they all looked at Inuyasha. He sneered. "What are you looking at me for?"

Kagome huffed, rolling her eyes. "Aren't you always the one complaining about too many detours?" She planted her hands on her hips. "Where should we go next?"

Inuyasha's eyes shifted to each of them, surprised at the seriousness in their expressions. He shifted on his feet. "Well I guess… first we gotta drop the old hag off."

Kaede cleared her throat. "A little gratitude would be most becoming of ye, Inuyasha."

Ignoring her, the hanyou looked around. "Did Myouga leave?"

"He said he had some investigating to do," Miroku said. "He'll come find us later."

Inuyasha shrugged carelessly. "Whatever."

They were still all staring at him. Even Kirara had turned to him, scarlet eyes blinking slowly.

So many expectations. The lump under his shirt felt heavy under their gazes.

"Where else?" he grunted finally, eyes flicking to the horizon. "We go after her."

The group sighed a collective breath of relief, much to his annoyance. Kagome bit her lip. "Inuyasha." The hope in her voice was palpable.

Miroku took a step forward and put a hand on his shoulder. "Are you sure?" he asked. "Not that I am arguing against it. But we'll have to start all over again, looking for the castle. And we'll have to ignore the other jewel shards for now if we do."

Inuyasha shrugged. "Nothing's changed. Where Sango is, Naraku will be." He cracked his knuckles, sneering. "And where Naraku is, the jewel is."

* * *

Hundreds of kilometers away, in a room with the shades drawn to block the rising sun, a woman sat alone.

Candle light flickered against the center table. She stared at it, back against a wall, arms around her knees, and only stirred when a knock sounded at the door and the shoji screen slid open just a little.

Outside, a servant bowed. "The Lord would like to speak with you."


End file.
